Sumitomo taps into Home Counties water

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Sumitomo hopes to use Japanese leak prevention technology to improve the efficiency of British pipes

Lucy AlexanderTokyo

Last updated at 10:33AM, February 5 2013

Japan has defeated China in the race to supply drinking water to the Home
Counties.

Sumitomo, the Japanese trading house, beat the Beijing Water Authority in an
auction to buy Sutton and East Surrey Water, which supplies water to 655,000
consumers across Surrey, West Sussex, Kent and South London.

The purchase, which the NikkeiBusiness Daily estimated at 42
billion yen (£286 million), is the second big Asian investment in the
British water supply sector since George Osborne toured Asia last year to
promote Britain’s infrastructure to investors.

Sumitomo said today that it had bought East Surrey Holdings, which owns